Faced with the jeering of the Twenty-Eight Lunar Mansions, Lian Zhen Star's face alternated between green and white.
Search his soul?
Inspect his private treasury?
Never mind what they might uncover. If they stripped him bare and searched him before all the immortal officials, where would that leave his dignity as a celestial deity? How could he ever show his face in the Heavenly Court again?
"Insolence!"
"Utter insolence!"
Lian Zhen Star was beside himself with rage, his neck stiff. "I am a Star Lord appointed by the Great Heavenly Venerable himself, a ranked immortal official! How dare you search me as though I were some demonic evil from the Mortal Realm? Where is a Star Lord's dignity? Where is the majesty of the Heavenly Court?!"
Hearing this, Chen Wei deliberately furrowed his brow, looking puzzled. "Star Lord, I don't understand. You keep talking about dignity and majesty. What, could it be that you cannot withstand an investigation?"
"Impossible!"
"Absolutely impossible!"
Lian Zhen Star delivered three denials in succession, waving his hands frantically. "I embezzled nothing! Those three hundred thousand years of merit were public funds! I have nothing but a clean breeze in my sleeves. How could I possibly fail an investigation?"
After roaring those three statements, he hastily turned toward the South Dipper Star Lord and the Big Dipper Star Lord. So long as the Southern Dipper and the Big Dipper spoke up and brought the full weight of the Lunar Mansions Government Office to bear, they could muddle their way through this affair.
But...
The Star Lords who had been chiming in just moments earlier all averted their eyes in unison.
The Big Dipper Star Lord tucked both hands into his sleeves, his eyes lowered toward his nose and his attention turned inward, as though he had